The Oathbreaker
by thesocketpuppet
Summary: Dark fantasy Elsanna AU in which Elsa and Anna grew up in a war-torn Arendelle. The question asked is: how would their traits change under the stress of violence? Anna is Queen, Elsa's her runaway sister turned mercenary, and Olaf is their half-brother. Over-the-top worldbuilding, VeryDark!Siblings, swordfights, princesst (with a double S!), fallen gods and magic.
1. sometimes i dream of ships

**Warning:** If you hadn't already seen it, this is a VERY dark!sibling AU.

* * *

**Chapter 1**

**sometimes I dream of ships**

**The Past**

_Elsa is ten, Anna is seven_

_**Anna**_

_Anna squealed when she recognized the chestnut horse that had arrived on the docks. Lifting her eyes, she met her sister's gaze. Though one was on land and the other on a ship, she felt the stares between them close the gulf of years they'd spent apart. Of course Elsa loved her, even after she spent so much time away._

_Anna turned away to smile triumphantly at Kristoff, who was staring at the eldest princess._

_"I told you!" she crowed in triumph. She knew Elsa would come. She returned her gaze to her sister._

_"Elsa," she shouted. She lifted a toy sword. She waved it around and smiled._

_Her big sister, already trained enough to hold her first sword, lifted her own and returned the smile. She could not have looked more beautiful, with her straight back, swept bangs, military coat and trousers, and plaited hair. To Anna's left, the Duke's children bowed to the Princess. Elsa nodded back. She could see Elsa's lips moving, but could not decipher the words._

_"She's asking us to take care of you," Brian said. A large boy and son of a duke, he was, like many noble children, being sent away for safety. Kristoff nodded at the side. "I swear it," she heard Kristoff saying, softly. At seven, Anna did not understand what the older boys were promising._

_Then the ship had cast off. Anna shrieked, then ran to the rear of the ship, coming as close as she could to her sister. But it was not close enough, for they were separated by a good twenty or so feet, and the gulf was widening swiftly._

_And then her father joined her sister, on his own horse, and suddenly Anna was struck by fear that she would never see them again._

_"It'll be okay, Princess Anna," Brian said. "We'll be home in a year or two. They'll sort out the mess with the Tornish."_

_She asked Brian to carry her on his shoulders, that she might see Elsa longer. She did not stop waving until the docks were far gone._

* * *

**The Present**

**Elya**

_"Oy, Coldsnap!"_

The spearfighter ducked with the warning and twirled to thrust at the attacker. She focused on the chest, a little left of the center, and the pole dug in like it always did. She turned to the side, this time sensing the next target in line, and backed away from a horizontal slash an inch or two away from her eyes. Then she ducked, the sound of spring snow crunching under her boots, and with a quick upward jab, she impaled the man, jaw to brain. She heard a gasp behind her and spun the spear with the impaled body around. The mangled corpse thudded against the next mark. Letting go of her spear, she lunged forward with a dagger from her cloak. She stabbed straight and sure, then drew back to retrieve her spear.

To her left was the giant Sir Marshall, some distance away. She could hear the crunch of bone against his morningstar and the wet sound of a boot stamping on an already-mauled face. She did not have to see the blood to know how it looked, soiling the earth. But the knight was surprised by two more bandits who'd jumped from the rocks above, down to the carriage that housed the Prince.

She ran behind the bandits and threw her spear, killing one and catching the other by surprise long enough to have his face turned to a bloody mush by Marshall's morningstar. Knight and mercenary nodded to each other and Elya left after taking her spear to rejoin the fray, jumping in to spear in defense of this comrade or that; throwing a dagger or tripping a careless fool and thrusting straight into their backs; deaths were piling up and she could hear it: _twelve_, she counted, and then a scream - _thirteen_ - and then a whimpering and a gurgling and the wet sound of blade meeting skin, blood blooming in gushes, then the crackle of broken bone - _fourteen._

She turned to the carriage when it was over and no other bandit - dressed in dirty white, as though camouflage would work - moved. Here and there she would spear a twitching body, sometimes through the skull, sometimes through the chest. Here and there she would catch a glint of gold and lift a chain with the tip of her weapon. Talismans, some of them. Some were fine gold, most were only plated. The other mercenaries were turning over bodies or sitting and scowling in pain. Some were drinking and none were checking on the principal. But that was fine, because the Knights of Arendelle attended to the boy. She sat against a tree trunk and watched, as the blonde Prince Olaf cried into the leader's chest. It was the mace-swinger, Sir Marshall. While she had not paid the knights much attention, she had seen Sir Marshall wreck a man's head with that mace of his, and he was faster than his looks implied. He was ignoring a long sloping slash on his back which gleamed red in the sunlight through his jerkin.

She surveyed her own comrades, her gaze returned by one of them. Sourpuss raised a thumb up, some distance away. She nodded back to him. _I'm alive,_ she was saying. _Thanks for the warning._ Nothing else needed to be said. Words were not needed between them.

"Thirty-seven!"

She had killed fourteen out of thirty-seven. Gooseflesh, who'd been counting along with some knight, began announcing the wounded, noting down ruined supplies, sorting out loot. Elya would throw in the gold (plated and real) that she'd pilfered from the corpses. But for now she rested against the tree and turned her gaze back to the Prince. Marshall's jerkin had finally been cut away and the exposed skin covered in a boiled cloth with herbs. The Knight held onto his crying charge the whole time. Glancing back at her mercenary squad, she found them just as transfixed at the sight as she was.

The roof was half torn from the carriage. It was missing two wheels at the back and slanted as a result. A knight stood behind Marshall and fussed. Marshall sat just inside. And Olaf howled as though he'd been cut and not Marhall, who was rubbing the boy's back. He was probably whispering that everything was fine. He kissed the boy's head and laid his chin atop, rocking Olaf's crying form.

"Elya?" she did not immediately notice Littlejon's gruff voice. "Oy, Snap. Quit gawking at the carriage. We're ah, supposed to help with some _for-en-sick_ or whatever the hell these damned knights call it."

"Forensic," Elya muttered. Olaf had her hair. Olaf had their father's nose. She could not help but stare.

"Whatever that shit is."

"They want to identify who the bandits are," she explained.

"Then why don't they just say it like that, fucking knights."

Elya got up and went to where all the bodies had been collected. The trail of blood smeared all over the road. Slush, dirt, rocks, blood. Bones and limbs littered the place. Gooseflesh was poking around, smelling limbs and putting them next to the bodies they belonged to. Sourpuss was watching the knight draw the likeness of one of the bandits.

"No patches," he said when they approached. "No insignia," he continued.

"Course not," Littlejon said, as though it were the most obvious thing. Elsa had picked up a foot. She looked at the thirty seven, none of whom stared back. At the last row, there was a dead man with a missing foot. She completed the body.

"They're bandits, yeah? They shouldn't have any identifying marks," Gooseflesh spoke up.

"What fine swords they have," Elya muttered. "So very fine for bandits. And consistent too. They all go and have their swords and spears made by the same smith."

"Therein lies the problem," the knight from Arendelle said, understanding the crass jab and the implication behind it. What his name was, it hardly mattered.

"We must find this smith," Littlejon joked. "He makes fine weapons."

Sourpuss groaned. "You are irrevocably stupid," he said at the giant. "They're being supplied. They're not just bandits. Someone is giving them good steel. Someone is giving them nice swords. Someone is giving them nicely fletched arrows. They're hired to kill the Prince or capture the Prince or whatever it is people do with princes, all under cover. Do you understand yet?"

"You needn't be so smug about it," Elya said.

The knight nodded. The device on his tattered cloak was a hound on the lower right of a cross, and the cross was bounded by a circle. Elya felt she knew the noble house he came from, but it was too long ago for her to remember.

Littlejon shot Elya a grateful look. Sourpuss caught it and sighed. "You'd have to be told where to swing that sword if Coldsnap were gone. You might not even find north. Ever."

The wailing had quieted. Finally the boy passed out. Marshall wrapped a dirty cloak over the Prince and set the boy down on the padded seat.

With the bandits dead, the carriage secured, and sun sinking, there was only one course of action. There would be no night marching tonight: he shouted for camp to be struck some distance away, on higher ground. They would resume their journey to Arendok, the capital, tomorrow.

* * *

**Sir Marshall**

Evening descended. Marshall glowered at the tent his men had set up, finding it flimsy. Inside was little help against the cold, while outside, the fire was pitiful. But it was better than nothing.

He sat outside. The tent was for the wounded and the Prince. He was fine.

He surveyed the landscape. It was a typical Arendellian spring evening: trees, bushes, some brown, lots of grey. Silvery light from the moon helped him define where they were. His men, all twelve, were changing dressings and putting away armor. The hired swords - they called themselves the Myrmidons - were doing the same. He wondered if they even knew what actual Myrmidons were; on the first day of the trip, he'd discovered most of them couldn't even _read_. But whatever their education, their fighting style was unmatched. They were largely unhurt, save one, who'd been bitten by an axe. The woman attended to him, the one they called Coldsnap. The mask that covered most of her face - it was explained that she was terribly scarred - had turned a dirty brown from the fight. She hadn't changed, so her clothes were red with dried blood. None of it was hers, of course.

"She's a monster," Ingmar said, noticing his captain's gaze. The tone was approval. Marshall made space for his intelligence officer to sit.

"That's why the Spymaster chose them, isn't that so?"

"She speared fourteen men," Ingmar said. "I checked the wounds."

"Mmm."

"She's just a little faster than you, eh?"

Marshall smiled wryly. "Just a bit."

He wondered what was behind the mask. When he closed his eyes he could still see her fighting style. What set her apart was her precision, her timing, and her footwork. He could not see how built she was, but she was relying on skill, not strength. When the enemy was well armored, she struck the joints where there was no armor. And she used her surroundings. And, most interestingly, she could drop her weapon, kill someone with a rock or a fallen dagger or sword, then come back to her spear or forget it as the situation demanded. Most knights could not control their instinct to hold on to their weapons. They couldn't let go. They couldn't trust their fists to fight against armor, or their eyes to look away from the immediate enemy. They couldn't see the whole picture.

A bandit had set a falling door on her as they fought next to a wagon, and she let go of the spear and rammed the door back in his face with two hands. Anyone else would have splintered the door with the spear on instinct, with a small, unlikely chance that it would hurt the bandit on the other side, for the blow would have been a weak counterattack. By then it would be jammed into the door, and Coldsnap would have to waste a move getting it free. But she had used the door instead, then kicked it, sending the bandit falling. Only then, with deliberate movements, did she pick up her spear left leaning on the side and bury it straight and sure into the door and into the bandit's chest. It was a simple change of tactics, but the difference between _when_ she speared the man, belied a flexibility he himself lacked.

She, on the other hand, took everything in, assessed the fastest way to kill, killed, and then lined the next target up. She did so with the fewest number of moves. Nor was she the only one. The economy of her style was matched by the other Myrmidons. He had never seen an archer fight equally against a swordsman with a bow and arrow in close quarters, but one of them did. It was a combination of bare fisted fighting. throwing daggers, and knowing when to improvise.

Thinking about the mercenaries the Queen hired kept him from getting angry at his own unpreparedness. Reports of bandits had been on the rise; they should have suspected _something_ when an avalanche had separated the Prince's Convoy from the Queen.

He was angry at himself now. So he spoke to Sir Ingmar: "Who do you think is behind this?"

It couldn't be Weselton. They were too broken, and too iron-poor with the recent trade sanctions. The Tornelands too were licking their wounds, but it was possible to borrow money for supplies.

"That's a stupid question and you know it, Sir Marshall. We have no leads. We report to the Spymaster and let them decide on a course of action. The Myrmidons are a bigger question."

Sir Marshall gladly followed Ingmar into that topic. "They were the Queen's choice, among the Spymaster's candidates." Hence the black hole in his knowledge. Why the Myrmidons? There were closer alternatives, cheaper alternatives, and every man from the West to the East of Arendelle would lay his life down for the Queen, and yet -

"It's... strange." Marshall looked at Ingmar. The intelligence officer looked apologetic of his critique of the Queen and Spymaster. Neither of them had been filled in on the details, despite their station.

"She knows something," Marshall murmured. "And we are in the dark until she chooses to reveal it. The only thing I know is, the Spymaster believes war is coming."

He heard the thud of his comrade's head against the tree they leaned on. They were quiet for a while.

"Sometimes I dream of ships," Sir Ingmar said. "They'll take us to a place without war. We'd almost raised the Prince without bloodshed. My children have never held a sword. And now - am I wrong to bring them up like this?"

Only a generation ago they'd been trained to fight from eight onwards. They felt naked without weapons, man and woman alike. Marshall could feel Ingmar cover his face with his hands.

"I grew up in the West, bordering Weselton," Ingmar said. "You could never think, you know? Every day we lived in threat from supposed bandits. Death sulked around us, and when it came our river ran red in the winter. You'd think we were fish, floating on the river, but if you speared the chunks floating around they were men and women and children. And then they burned my village and razed the next and no one could save us because the Tornish had dug deep into the East and sacked Arenberg. I grew up thinking that no one would save us, not the King anyway, not until I finally walked to Arenberg and found it smoldering."

"How did you get to Arendok?"

"I didn't. I stayed in the dungeon of Arenberg and ate rats. My brothers and I all did. And then spring came and the King's Men retook Arenberg. They brought us to the orphanage. Lots of us were there, all starved and missing an eye or a foot or a hand. And then we were fed and we were taught and I found out that there was nothing left of East Arendelle at all. Not even children without parents. But that didn't stop me from hating, you know."

"I know," Sir Marshall said.

"I just knew who to hate," Sir Ingmar said.

"I know," Sir Marshall said.

They fell silent.

Though the war had formally started thirteen years ago (and ended after two), the truth was that border skirmishes were frequent for years before that, especially at the border between the Tornelands and Arendelle. Marshall did not recall a time in his life when he lived without threat of Tornish 'banditry', when in truth it was the Tornish King's own military. Helios, known as the Savage Lord, overran the Eastern Arendellian plains, the agricultural seat of the country, with a lightning fast tactic of lunging and retreating.

Weselton, at the West, was supposed to at least be neutral, but when the war started, they pillaged without warning and sent burning corpses into Arendelle's center, impregnated with poisonous fumes. Not that there was anyone left to spook. Refugees ran to cities, taxing the cities' supplies. But the East was the worst, for the Tornish took no prisoners, only killed, and the single Arendellian army was no match for the Tornish troops reinforced with companies of mercenaries. It was only when Corona sent in a fleet of their own that the tides turned. That, and the Savage Lord made the mistake of creating a second military campaign of another neighboring country.

However, foreigners repulsed or not, Arendelle's character had changed from one of tension to one of barbarism. Peace could not be secured after the Tornish were driven away and the Weseltonians gone. Refugees looted and took to pillaging cities and killing their own. Marshall doubted that any of them had clean hands. From the royalty and nobility down to the bakers on the street, everyone had killed someone.

Coronan forces were forced to step in and attack Arendellian bandits to restore order, for many refused to lay down their swords and reenter a rebuilding society. They could not believe in the peace the King promised. And they died for their lack of faith in the Royal Family. Marshall had spilled Arendellian blood; he'd accepted the red on his hands a long time ago.

But that was an era at its close. One look at Prince Olaf assured Marshall of that. Arendelle would have children, he thought. Children who didn't grow up eating rats or holding daggers. Children who didn't grow up to banditry in desperation, who would have to be killed.

The Queen would make that country. And he, along with the rest of the knights, had sworn to help her. They'd protect the peace, whatever threat appeared. A simple equation for a simple man. Marshall had no complaints.

* * *

**Elya**

She watched Olaf warm himself by the fire, fascinated by the sameness of their hair. He was only her half-brother, as far as she knew, but he looked, quite frankly, like a male version of her own self, with Anna's mannerisms. Even when miserable his ears seemed to flop a bit.

_Just like Anna._

_No, the Queen. She's a Queen now._

Thinking about Anna on the throne, the glimpses of her back, her strangely tall height - such thoughts did not end well. Elya, being a mercenary, did not have the honor of seeing the Queen's face. She'd been assigned to the tail end. And she'd been half relieved and half angry at herself; relieved that she didn't see Anna, afraid of her own reaction, and angry at herself that she wanted to see the Queen.

It was no longer her place. Her place was at the tail. Her place was at the rear guard. And she was thankful for it, when the avalanche had struck and they'd had to backtrack to a fork in the road. She was thankful, suddenly, for if she were not in the rear bandits would have struck and she had no faith in the pretty knights and their pretty armor. She could not trust anyone but the Myrmidons to keep her brother safe. Well, she thought, Sir Marshall was not so bad.

Robin would call her _compromised_ by her emotions. He was right, utterly correct, and his assessment that she not be included in the guard detail was objectively the correct decision. But he'd been overruled by their platoon leader, the Monkey. She'd spoken: _Elya at the rear, Robin and I in front._ He'd shrugged and said: _Elya, you're going to hurt yourself you know?_ Then he'd waddled off, and those who knew her secret swore they'd watch over her. And that was that.

Her mind returned to the word _compromised_. She was compromised, most of all, by her dreams and fantasies. She would think of many what-ifs, many silly scenarios, each more desperate than the last. Until she'd open the door to a daydream she'd kept secret for years: a family dinner. A family dinner with everyone in it.

She had never met her step mother, but even she had a place in the family table of Elya's dreams.

_Damn you, Elya. Just. Stop._

She was thankful for her distance from the Prince; the ring of knights separated the commoner mercenaries from royalty. Her kind leaned against logs placed side by side, all sitting close together, shoulders touching, stink mingling in the air at the edge of the camp. The leather jerkins and some pieces of iron armor were all hanging on branches though everyone knew they wouldn't dry in the damp air. The weapons were clean and ready to be picked up at a moment's notice.

Elya counted her squad, made of eight Myrmidons. Littlejon was scratching himself (he hadn't washed or shaved in a while). The rest of the squad looked fine, if a bit annoyed at the evening cold. Next to her, Sourpuss shifted around, touching the dressing she'd made for him.

"Tough bastard," Sourpuss murmured. She knew the wiry man meant Marshall. "Takes a cut like that and holds the boy so patient. You'd think he was his brother. Nice save of the boy, Elya. He looks quite a bit like you. "

Elya touched the mask that hid the scars on her face. She said nothing. "Maybe they're in the market for wayward princesses," Sourpuss joked.

"Please."

"I didn't mean to imply you would," he said. _Leave us._ The words were left unsaid. He knew the truth, the truth that Elya should not have been in Arendelle at all.

She looked down at the slush and dirt, the cover of earth they had been travelling for a week. When she looked up at footsteps crunching through the dark, she did not expect the towering Sir Marshall to kneel at her level.

"Thank you," he rasped.

"Do we get a bonus?" It was a predictable quip from Sourpuss.

"No doubt the Queen will give."

_How is the Prince,_ Elya wanted to ask. But she only nodded and kept her gaze down. Marshall, realizing that he was not wanted, repeated his thanks and left. She watched him retreat to the fire, picking up the Prince and returning to the tent of his charge, new white shirt fluttering in the cold.

The knights closer to the warmth were watching her, no doubt displeased by her curtness. But they said nothing and crept closer to the fire.

"I will take first watch," she said, staring at the knights.

* * *

_There were times when she dreamed. Sometimes of the desert, sometimes of the castle, and sometimes, she dreamed of the sea. It would be at that precise moment that the ship carrying her sister, bound for Corona, had disappeared into the horizon._

_She would turn to her father, smile wiped off her face, and ask if she could be sent to the East, along with him._

_He would shake his head and tell her to stay at Arenberg. He would beg her to go to Corona and stay there with her sister. And she would always say no, thinking of the streak of white on her sister's hair._

_She would make herself a snowflake. It would float in the air by her will. Her father would watch, each time. Then she'd turn the snowflake into spikes, and then they'd explode._

_"The Tornish aren't replying to us, are they, father?"_

_He would shake his head._

_"When the war comes, I will be ready."_

_"It won't come to that."_

_Stop it, his eyes would say. This is not your fight. Agdar would often dismiss the topic of war with his daughter, but Elsa had grown up on her own. Whatever Agdar was hoping for his eldest, the war (for it was a war, in all but name) had taken the image of his smiling eldest princess away._

_Elsa was not sorry for the loss of what the elders around her called 'innocence.' To her, it was nothing but condescension. Even in her dreams, she could see advisors terrified of the First Princess, speaking words no ten year old should have to say._

_The dream would end in the council room at Arendok's fort, with Elsa sitting next to her father. She'd look into the window that showed the sea and see Anna's face. Without realizing it, she would make a horse out of ice, and a pretty little girl on it. Agdar would be talking about something, and she would stand and walk to the window (permitted as only princesses are) and put the ice horse and ice princess on the windowsill, thinking about her sister._

_Elya woke up._

* * *

**_Glossary:_**

Principal - a bodyguard's charge/ward. Basically the person the bodyguard must protect.  
Weselton - I know it's usually spelled Weaselton, but spelling as (properly) pronounced is my preference for this nation

Comments always appreciated. I need a beta, honestly. Unfortunately I'm a pretty choosy beggar.

_Updates twice a month, 1st and 3rd Wednesdays/Thursdays on ffnet and 1st and 3rd Sundays on AO3._


	2. nice doesn't work so well

**Ch2: Nice doesn't work so well**

* * *

_**Present Day**_

**Queen Anna**

_She was dreaming:_

_A hydra of human heads, and she had the sword to cut them off._

_She recognized the faces, but each time she cut them off, two more would appear._

_She looked to her left hand, but the torch was out. There was no flame to seal the heads in._

_She begged for her sister to seal them away with her magic. But then Elsa took her hands and shoved her back._

Who are you?

_The dream ended with Anna being swallowed; maybe by a duke's son, whom she'd killed at sixteen. Sometimes it was just a face, a memory of a soldier she'd cut, or a bandit or a traitor. Her sleeping mind remembered what her waking memories all blurred together._

* * *

Anna awoke with a gasp. She was alone, terribly alone in a room whose largeness only served to mock her lack of company. It was nine on the dot, according to the clock, and the spring sun greeted her room with light. Outside, birds were twittering. She could smell the dust and warmth and the green things sprouting.

Last night had been warm. Spring was giving way to summer.

She took a deep breath. Put her hands on her face. Kristoff was just outside, she was sure. But if she let him in, she was not sure she could be the Queen she had to be...

A painting swung with a slight creak, and her spymaster walked in. He closed the tunnel.

Jeremy.

Fuck.

She'd forgotten that today was Friday: time for his weekly reports.

"Good morning, my Queen -" Jeremy stopped and laughed at the Queen in bed. "Someone overslept."

"Shut up, Jeremy." She heard him walking down the stone steps, his boots clacking against stone, towards a small table. There was a bucket, and a bottle of wine, and the ice used to cool the wine had all melted. She heard him lift the wine with a _plop_ of protest from the water.

"And all the ice has turned to water. I didn't agree to this for you to suddenly change your mind, you know. Or maybe this _is_ an improvement." He pretended to think about it. "Drunk Queen or Sober Queen? Both of them are equally late wakers." When Anna didn't respond right away, he asked: "Should I run you a bath?"

"No, I'll get dressed. Pick something out for me, please."

"Say 'good morning' first."

Anna looked at him. He turned to her with a dazzling, boyish smile, eyes on her face.

"Good morning, Spymaster."

She moved to the side of the bed away from him, towards the folding screens.

Jeremy rewarded her with good news. "Your brother's asleep in his room," he said. Then he switched the subject. "And your skin looks awful," Jeremy commented. "You need a better skin regimen."

Jeremy tossed her a tunic over the screens. As she changed, she heard him open her clothes closet. She was glad he could not see her face, for she could feel the relief wash over her at the news of her brother's safe return. Jeremy had assured her he was fine, that the birds had sent word, but the past two evenings were tense. She waved off the annoyance she felt at Jeremy for being so clipped with his reports, but told herself to deal with it. Like having a cold bath in the morning to wake up, that was what Jeremy's words were for.

"Oh my," he said. "What a variety. Green jacket with trimmings, green jacket without trimmings, green jacket with embroidery..." she felt herself smile. "Truly my Queen, I envy your limitless choices with your personal tailor. It's clear you've abused your right to wear whatever you want."

Anna stepped out of the folding screen. She entered her bathroom. As she washed up, she could hear Jeremy rifle through her closet, probably looking for something that wasn't her standard green.

Cleaned up, she stepped out. She picked up her comb ran it through her hair. Fucking ow.

Jeremy laid two green jackets on the bed for her to choose. After picking out her handkerchief, he attended to the queen, who'd since put on her trousers. She lifted her hands and let him slide the jacket's sleeves on (a disappointing green jacket with no trimmings or embroidery).

"There was a little run in with bandits. Sir Marshall was cut a bit but no one was badly hurt," he continued with his report. "We did lose some of the supply wagons."

Anna kept her features bland as she listened.

"And your sister is alive and safe. And she hasn't taken off the damn mask, which means her face must be full of dirt and sweat.

Anna snapped her head up from buckling the belt. Jeremy stepped back to admire his handiwork.

"That wasn't the end of my report, Queen Anna."

"I'm not in the mood to practice my patience," she said.

"You were doing very well," Jeremy grumbled. "Just a little more. You always wait for them to spill the beans before you make any kind of reaction, if you make any reaction at all."

_You don't beg. You don't ask 'what next?' You never give away how badly you want to hear news of anything. You do not give away what it is you want._ Anna knew that of course, but it annoyed her that Jeremy would always cut his reports into tiny bits sandwiched between frivolous bullshit. He said it was how nobles spoke. "Full of shit," he'd said once. "So get used to it."

She shook her head of the past. "Jeremy," she warned him.

"I was about to get on with the report about the bandits, but I know, I know. Sisters before misters. With regards to Princess Elsa, I've asked for an audience with the Myrmidons in thirty minutes. You can break your fast with them after." Anna moved to make her hair in a bun; Jeremy stopped her.

"Keep your hair down," he advised. Anna quirked a brow but did as she was advised.

"About Princess Elsa," he started. "Remember it's Coldsnap, not Elsa. And don't single her out. Say thanks. Give the bonus. Invite their leader to dinner. Suggest to them the second job of ferrying you across the sea to Corona. You'll ask for Elsa's presence after your dinner with the leader. "

"Monkey," Anna said. "The leader's name, right?"

"Right. Woman from the Far East. Whatever you do, do not invite Elsa to be part of your Queensguard. You will be rejected. The Myrmidons regard each other as family."

"And no one leaves their family," Anna muttered.

Jeremy smiled. Like Anna's own smiles, his held no joy.

* * *

**The Monkey**

Finally, the job was finished. After waiting for two days in the outer bailey, the second convoy had arrived the night before. The Prince was whisked off to bed and she had a chance to speak with her fellow mercenaries from the tail end. Nothing, of course, was worth reporting. She took one look at the cheap gold pickings Sourpuss had collected and snorted. Oh, maybe it'd be enough to buy a meal or two. Would that they had a proper campaign, the kind where they could raid and loot. She missed the after-battle lootings, where they were free to make as much noise as they wanted in a smoking city, free to break jars and see what lay underneath, free to plunder family cupboards and closets for maybe a jade hairpin or a gold watch, or some woman's dowry or some man's inheritance. And a whole city would cough up its hidden history, and they'd take it all. Extra points if they had to beat the lord's soldiers to the pillaging; the competition made it so much more enjoyable.

Oh no, these days she was stuck with guard detail. She knew some of her fellow Myrmidons performed escort duty almost exclusively, but not her. But then it had been a long time since the whole company could be afforded by a lord long enough for a whole campaign. Very frequently now they would split up into different jobs, meet at some city, make merry, and then meet again for their winter rest.

Her thoughts turned to her current place of employment. Arendok Castle was not what she expected. It was true that Arendok was overall pragmatic, being the demand of a rebuilding country and a large city, but she expected Arendok Castle to be... well, proper.

Like all the noble houses and royal castles in other kingdoms.

Arendok Castle, however, was a fort first and foremost. Barracks and smithy and kitchen were each large; everyone had a place to work in, a master to answer to, a creation they could be proud of. The castle's walls were fairly new (she guessed that when Arendelle was at war, the fort was suitably enlarged) and sturdy. The castle surely smelled right to her: animals pushing things, cooks preparing certain foods outside, the scent of washing and tanning and smithing. She did not deny how enjoyable it was, even to smell the sour things. To know such bustle and your place in it. An alewife passed by and all her boys inahaled: beer! Beer was being brewed right here. Robin grinned.

But they continued their walk into the inner bailey and then the castle proper. Drinks could wait; they'd been summoned by the Queen.

Monkey expected ornaments and frills and there were none. When she entered the corridor leading to the great hall, she expected painted walls, dark purple for its rarity, as was the preference of most royalty - but there was none of that pretty shit, as Littlejon would put it.

She turned her head to make sure her people were following. Robin, following her, snorted at the spectacle. Littlejon stopped at paintings and proudly read the names; the younger mercenaries fingered the blades on the wall; the older mercenaries explained they were useless (said blades were promptly dropped and ignored).

"Yeh...gri...teh," Littlejon rumbled, proudly. Next to him Sourpuss rolled his eyes.

_Ygritte._

"Igrit," Elya said gently.

"But why!" Littlejon looked ready to throw the painting for offending his reading skills.

"Because reading is beyond idiots like you," Sourpuss growled. "Now hurry the fuck up, or we'll get lost."

Monkey doubted that. The castle was built for function, not to impress. But in that way, it was impressive: one of the few castles that were never laid low by invading forces. She saw many of the lesser halls as they walked to the grand hall: likely they had housed the wounded at some point. Coronan and Arendellian forces had slept here; had been healed here; had been fed here. War-bred, Arendok stock were proud of their heritage and it showed in ways that mattered.

She could hear Elya soothe Littlejon with the promise of teaching him later that day.

"She spoils that big baby, I swear."

She snorted. If Littlejon would fix his footwork he could easily outmatch Elya, who lacked the stamina for a prolonged battle. The man was built for heavy armor and heavy fighting, but he had not yet learned enough. Big baby would hardly be the word for him then.

She could see him tearing through a battlefield in the open plains, needing only to be told which colors were the enemies.

She said: "Reading is hardly a wasted skill..."

Robin snorted. "You have more faith in him than I thought!"

"What, I've made mistakes before," Monkey joked. In truth she didn't know if Littlejon could be taught.

They'd arrived at the doors. The footmen opened the large, heavy doors - and there sat the Queen.

She did not wear a crown on her head, but a circlet, a simple gold band.

She did not wear a woman's dress at all, but trousers, heavy boots and a military jacket. No trimmings anywhere.

And she wore a sword - most of the folk simply called it the Slayer - the same sword that had lopped heads off traitors. It was not a large sword, but clearly it was used. Far more intimidating than a greatsword meant to show off, too heavy to be carried, as she had seen in some forts.

Though Monkey's own face never changed to show what she felt, she studied her own reactions. She would have smiled, but she did not. She was not impressed so much as she was satisfied, in a strange way.

For she sat upon the throne carelessly, comfortably - the stance of a woman who held power and knew it. Her back was not ramrod straight at all, but easy, as though the world were unfolding a show for her to enjoy. Head rested on her chin, elbow on the armrest: it was a great act to pull off, and Monkey did not like to admit that, perhaps it was not just satisfaction she felt.

The throne stood ten steps higher than the rest of the room, on the dais, and it was the severest great hall Monkey'd seen. There were tables to eat in, but no carpets; only doors on the sides and the Queen and her knights, neatly placed like figurines on a board. There was a hearth, of course, but it was unused. The light shone from a hole directly above the Queen, dappling on her fire-red tresses. And when the light danced it seemed almost like Queen Anna was on fire.

A trick of the light, but something the commoners would take comfort in. Queen Anna had styled herself an avenging sort of Queen; everything about her agreed with the role, from her features to her manner.

All the Myrmidons arranged themselves into the room, fitting easily. Their steps were clear in the silence of the morning.

The man at the side of the dais made a little bow, introducing the Queen. "Queen Anna of Arendelle, The Summer Queen."

The Queen thanked them for their success during the tour around West Arendelle. Then the gold was brought in and someone had to hoot. An additional small bag was awarded for the successful protection of the Prince. Her boys were jostling around now, surrounding Robin, who was biting on every other gold coin, making sure it was real. A crass gesture; Robin had been a thief and liked to rile nobility. But he got no pleasure; none of the knights twitched, and Queen Anna herself seemed amused. The faint smile on her face could either be beatific or malicious. Monkey decided she liked it.

"We are taking a convoy of ships to Corona next week for the Summer Ball," the Queen said. "We only require a single squad for this mission."

"You'll want good swimmers," Monkey murmured. "How long?"

"A month," The Queen said.

She thought about it. Money was money, and she hadn't heard from the rest of the company. It was likely that the recent lull in war across the whole land meant they were out of work. She turned to her men: Littlejon, who couldn't swim, Robin, still counting coins like a miser, and Elya at the back, looking at the floor. If she didn't want to stand out, she was doing a poor job of it.

"Allow me to discuss the logistics with my sergeant."

Robin, she noted, choked at the title. _Sergeant._

* * *

**Kristoff, the Rock Knight**

After breakfast was served and the Myrmidons welcomed to the castle (and especially the training grounds), Kristoff found himself at Marshall's side. They sat on a barrel and watched the Myrmidons spar outside, on a wide flat plain. Patches of grass poked out of the ground; practice swords were picked up, soldiers watched and moved around.

He said, "They don't look that tough." No indeed, with their mismatched armor and plain swords.

"They're quite good, really."

Kristoff grunted. He hadn't liked the idea of hiring mercenaries, less so after hearing the Spymaster had a hand in them.

"They were the Queen's decision," Marshall said firmly, reading his mind.

"I respect her decisions, but not when the Spymaster might be whispering in her ear."

Marshall sighed. "This rivalry is splitting the castle's defense. You should have stayed with the Queen."

Kristoff thought, with a grim pleasure, that the split was completely in his favor. The town watch, the castle watch, and the militia were all clearly in coordination with the inner retinue, the hird. The spymaster had his little army of cowardly spies, but Kristoff knew who was loyal. He had fought with these men: they stayed with him. The Spymaster could hardly hold a sword the right way.

"I couldn't stay and be consort after she ascended. It would have made things... complicated."

It was something he often told himself. And he knew Marshall's reply: that birth didn't matter to a country rebuilding. With the peerage reduced by at least half, most of the knights were knighted for valor, not their family's name. It had overall strengthened the knighthoods, of course, but across the sea, some royals twittered about the baseborn retinue the Queen surrounded herself with.

"No, now you sulk as though a scorned paramour and worry that a man-lover like the Spymaster could really be the Queen's bedmate. Are we gossips or are we knights, I wonder."

Kristoff blushed in shame. "Sulking...you keep telling me this, but how am I supposed to look to another after having been with the Queen?"

"By lying to yourself about what befits a knight's station."

The words stung, but Marshall was the blunt sort. Kristoff hesitated before replying. "Queen Anna will refuse me now. I just wish that... we could at least be friends again. She spends her time with the advisors, the training dummies, and that pansy. We could have gone hunting together, at least."

Marshall looked at him reprovingly. "You keep lying to yourself, Sir Kristoff. Who you miss is the Princess, not the Queen. Now be quiet, because I want to watch them -" he nodded to the Myrmidons - "fight each other."

There was a loud cheer then, from a ring of sitting mercenaries. A tan woman was instructing a beast of a man on the right, while a pale ginger advised a scrawnier fighter. Kristoff cast down his eyes.

_Who you miss is the Princess, not the Queen._

It was true. He couldn't be with Queen Anna. But the Princess he knew? Where had that girl gone? One day he was fighting in the East, and the next Princess Anna became co-ruler with the King. He hadn't been there for the announcement. He hadn't even gotten a letter. And when he came back, he came back to a stranger. And he'd only been gone a year. What happened, he would never know.

He heard the swinging of a door open. A figure emerged from one of the portals. There was no way to ignore the sight: long dark robes and a bright red tunic on a wimpy, slight build gave away who it was. Master Jeremy, the Queen's favorite. And worse still, he made his way to Kristoff, the crunch of his shoes annoying the knight.

But he was given only a nod from Jeremy, who addressed Marshall: "Sir Marshall, would you please introduce me to the one they call Coldsnap? I have something to give her."

And so they walked over to where the blonde was sitting, on a crate, some distance away from the crowd. She was writing words down on the dirt with the tip of her spear.

Jeremy bowed a little after being properly introduced. The woman gave a nod. "I heard about your skill, Lady Coldsnap -"

"Coldsnap is all I am."

" - and I thought to give you this."

He held out a child's book from somewhere in his flowing robes.

"I was told that you're a teacher. I hope you find some use for this."

Coldsnap accepted without comment and began flipping through the pages. Some of the pages were very simple: just an illustration and a word. Gradually the words turned into sentences, the pictures growing more complex along with them. The gilding of the text indicated the important things: sometimes nouns, sometimes actions.

"And is there anything you want in return?"

"I would like to trade a gold coin for one of the talismans your fellows picked up."

Coldsnap unhitched a pouch from her belt. Kristoff wasn't stupid: how'd he know she'd have it?

Jeremy held the talismans with a kerchief, careful not to hold them with his hands. "The style is definitely not Arendellian," he said. And then he turned to Kristoff. "The western border patrol should probably be increased."

Kristoff fought down his irritation at being told what to do. The Spymaster didn't even know where it was from. He couldn't take a guess so simply that they were from Weselton. "Perhaps."

"Do you think that the talismans are Weseltonian?"

Jeremy looked at Marshall in surprise. "Weselton isn't the only country that can sneak in from the west. But we are boring the mercenary with politics. It's not her problem." He gave Coldsnap a gold coin. "I'm sure this should be enough," he said. "Will the book be useful for your student?"

"Yes."

"Good! I was once tutor to two Princesses - though not so much with the elder - so I like it when these things work out."

By then the practice duel had been won and Coldsnap's student - the big one - had come to see what the fuss was about. The other Myrmidons were milling about, some of them reading aloud in varying degrees of wrongness what was written on the dirt.

"There's only one queen though," the big man said, butting into the conversation. He drank loudly from a dipper at the side. The spymaster did not seem at all concerned with all the slobbering, or the fact that they hadn't been introduced.

"The elder sister ran away," Jeremy said. "A very nice princess, if a bit timid. Nice doesn't work so well during war... and things were complicated with her. But the whole thing is done now, and she's gone, and we're doing well enough. Enjoy your afternoon lessons."

_Fucking ass,_ Kristoff thought. It was easy to look back and say 'oh things didn't work out, that one ran away' - but Elsa had been twelve when the war started and only thirteen when Arenberg was sacked and her mother killed in front of her. He'd wondered, for a long time, if she would return, he'd thought something ought to be done: but then Jeremy was gone, and Kristoff's attention taken to a challenge between the knights and the mercenaries.

Next chapter: 'If you think blood makes a sister'

"The woman that stood before you is someone named Coldsnap. If you think blood makes a sister, you will find yourself disappointed."

* * *

**Glossary:**

Inner and outer bailey - parts of the castle separated by the inner and outer wall, respectively. The Great Hall is in the inner bailey.

Hird - translates as an informal retinue of the current royal; historically the origin of some aristocratic families growing from serving the Queen as advisors and knights. Vassals of the Queen, basically.

**Next chapter:** _'If you think blood makes a sister'_

"The woman that stood before you is someone named Coldsnap. If you think blood makes a sister, you will find yourself disappointed."

* * *

Comments always welcome. Beta reader or editor appreciated.

Update schedule: Mondays on AO3, Thursdays on FF except when late.

You can also check here: ateliersockpuppet . tumblr . com for status reports. Thank you.

Also, I forgot that FF doesn't allow replying to anon reviewers. Thank you very much to the anon/guest who reviewed. Cheers.


	3. what kind of death was that

**Chapter 3: What kind of death is that**

/**/

* * *

**Opening notes:**

Sorry about the delay! I had to cut and reassign several scenes (which means the last chapter's preview is... now totally inaccurate.) Sorry. I won't be making that mistake again.

I think at this point it's safe to assume that Dense, Gory, No Guarantee warnings should stay on for the remainder of the story.

FFnet only: I've had to use special symbols (/**/) for spacing reasons.

**Chapter Summary:**

In which we find out about Elya's powers, and a bit about her past.

/**/

* * *

**The past**

Elsa and Sourpuss are 17 years old

/*

*/

_It was an escort job, not unlike any other. Ferry this chief from point a to b. Nothing complicated._

_Elsa_ (no, she had changed her name now)_ was watching over a convoy, assigned far above the road. She was sitting on a crag like a bird. Peacefully perched above, she could rest for the evening, and perhaps even allow herself a drink when Sourpuss offered._

_Having safely sealed away her magic, she was discovering things about herself, things that she couldn't have discovered, having been coated in fear of her powers for so long. She found out that she liked evenings. That she didn't mind long marches. That she enjoyed the company of others. Without the sword hovering over her head - without her powers - she could breathe. Even her body was warm now, her ice safely contained within seals tattooed on her limbs. This was the identity she'd found, in her travels away from Arendelle. Her name was Elya now, to the Myrmidons, and her use-name was Coldsnap._

_The old god who sealed her magic had called it self-mutilation, but what did an old god know of a human's struggle? And in the end he'd done it anyway. He said it would give her no peace._

Listen kid, you're gonna think you're happy. You're gonna think all this pain is worth it. You're as mad as the rest of your kind. You're asking me to cut your soul in half. There's no other way to seal your magic. You'll be soulless for seven years.

Sure, you won't dream. No nightmares or whatever.

But sure, you won't feel, either.

_He went on to talk about hollowness and feelings and all that crap. He was wrong though. She did feel. She could still feel the sting of sand in her eyes, the flicker of annoyance at grit in her hair and boots. The weariness of travelling through desert and mountain. She could feel all of that. Maybe there was a slight disconnection, as though she were feeling things from a distance, but that was fine._

_Her powers were gone at last. She was human at last. The same as anyone else._

_And so here she sat, watching the men below set up camp. She heard the scrape of a boot on rock. Her head swiveled to the sound: it was Sourpuss, probably going to watch the stars come out. They'd been teaching each other constellations. As expected, he had his flask on his hip._

_She made space for him to sit._

_"We're so close to the capital we can see it via spyglass from here," Sourpuss said._

_"Which is why you're going to get drunk now?"_

_"It's the perfect weather for it! Nice and cold. And the dunes are so pretty."_

_"There isn't much to see."_

_"Are you kidding? Look at that. They're patterns. Of sand. Endless waves."_

_"Endless waves of nothing, you mean?"_

_"You just don't have any poetry in your soul, Elya."_

_"I don't have a soul," she said. And maybe she deserved that. Maybe a small part of her agreed with Hades, former lord of the undead, that she didn't have a soul anymore. It didn't matter._

_"I'm sorry," Sourpuss said suddenly, aware that he may have touched a sore point. For the harshness of his life, he was gentle underneath it all. Though he was a grump to everyone else, he and Elsa were comfortable enough to be less curt (on her end) and less patronizing (on his) with each other._

_"I deserve it," Elsa murmured._

_"Hey. You can talk to me, you know?"_

_"Dinner first," she said, as blue light dyed the sand dunes in evening. She leaned back and tipped her head up, watching the stars come out._

_She'd tell him tonight about the runaway princess of Arendelle, that one who murdered her mother. They'd spent some time during the trip talking about their pasts: his, at a whore-house in the Southern Isles, and hers, living in war-torn Arendelle._

_/**/_

_After a quick sketch of Arendelle's history against the Tornish, Elsa went straight to her story._

_"When I was thirteen," Elsa began, looking into the distance, into something that wasn't really there, "Arenberg was sacked. Before that, I'd been in one battle, at one of the larger towns, and I... I erected a wall there. Of ice. To help with the evacuation. I can't really remember much, but I remember passing out with the effort. I was just a child, after all. Then I woke up back at Arenberg and found out that while the villagers had been evacuated, the wall was eventually destroyed by the Tornish. The next few days were spent in preparation for battle, and I was supposed to leave with my mother. But I kept on holding out, thinking that because I'd been to one warzone, I could handle another._

_"I mean, I wanted to be useful, you know? My mother was a healer, she took care of those who entered the castle, supervised the care of the wounded... and my father was fighting... and I was useful, at last. My hands were useful. I was growing up. You know how it is when you're at that age and you think to yourself this is it, this will make me a woman, or some such bullshit, or how you can't just sit around and let things happen._

_"You really thought you could kill someone, huh?" then Sourpuss laughed. "But then, I did kill a woman at twelve."_

_Their situations, Elsa thought, were different. Both grim, but different. He'd been a whipping boy named Alexander before someone let slip he was a bastard of the king's, and then he was supposed to be dead, but then someone got greedy and sold him instead of killing him. Got paid twice off the same boy: Alexander's supposed murder, and then Alexander's purchasing; he grew up as a young thing all collared and chained up in a bright green room, ready for the night. He was passed around, men and women both, for his red hair and hairless body._

_She studied his pretty-boy features and thought of how little good it had done him. He'd killed a client, a woman who burned him for shits and giggles, then ran off naked into the night, with nothing but a blanket between him and his owners. Somehow he ended up with the Myrmidons._

_"Elsa?" Alexander prompted her. She'd been quiet for too long._

_"I panicked. When they attacked. My father was called to the front and my mother took my hand. But I was panicking so hard that my ice was freezing everything."_

Did she freeze her mother's hand? She didn't remember anything but smoke and cannon and the clang of swords. The stuffiness of the castle, and later on the burning capital suffocating all those within it with enemy forces.

_"It was at the stables when I yanked my hand away from her."_

Yes, she saw the frost on her mother's hand. And the determination on her mother's face. Elsa thought: No! It's my turn to do something.

_"There were three exits - east, west, and the southern exit that led back to the castle. I ran to one end and I thought I could... protect my mother, you know? I iced the outside of the eastern exit, screaming at my mother to leave while she could._

She saw the soldiers on the eastern end fall upon her ice. She tried to conjure spires. She would later imagine herself impaling them, one of her many fantasies.

For she did no such thing.

_"The eastern exit was secure, but when I turned around, invading knights from the castle were all coming in. I panicked at the sound and... I froze the entire building. Floor to ceiling. It was a thin sheen of ice. Like the ice on a lake._

_"My mother slipped," Elsa murmured. Then she snorted. In her dreams, back in the days that she_ could_ dream, she'd float to the scene, disembodied. Some part of her would laugh, madly, at the sight: a woman slipping, and a knight with spikes on his feet attacking. His sword would bite deep into the woman's back, her expression in open shock at the fall, then in pain. The moment would stretch out, playing too slowly; either way, Elsa couldn't control it. It was her dream, and still she had no control over it._

_"She was cut down from behind. I still remember how the blood gushed out. For a long time, I thought to myself: what kind of death was that? Slipping on some ice and cut wide open at the back. Gaping like a fish. She didn't die with dignity. I couldn't even give her that."_

_The black knight had hacked her mother open, the woman's back then skull then finally Idunn fell and even then the other knights couldn't stop when they stabbed into the dead woman._

_"And I froze everything. I froze everyone. I couldn't help it. I froze myself. I think part of Arenberg may have frozen. But then it didn't matter because they were setting fire to the whole place. The Torneland vanguard knights had known of my ice, so they were equipped accordingly. Their lower ranked soldiers and mercenaries, they didn't care about. So that's how they got to my mom, even with the ice on the floor. My dad was saved by a general - General Magnusson - and they found me and picked me out of the frost and...took my mother's body. Her blood must have been all over the ice. Or the ice would be all over the blood. I have no memory of that._

_"I was mad for a month at Arendok. You know, insane. At least, I think it was a month. I was ill. King Agdar was losing his war. He'd lost his wife. His daughter was mad with powers of frost. I had to be confined to a cell, the farthest room in the dungeon, because my ice would spread out and chill the wounded in the other halls of Arendok. I was in a cell with three doors between me and the hall, and the ice would make the doors brittle. Sometimes I wonder if I ever shattered a door. My father didn't want to put me in there. It was the advisor. Henrik. He had no choice but to advise my father what no one else wanted to say."_

She remembered Henrik giving her chocolate before things went to hell. Her tutor for much of her childhood, Henrik aged a decade for every year of war.

_"Did you ever talk to your father about what happened?"_

_"I said I killed her. He didn't believe me, of course."_

_Something was wrong. By now she should be crying, or upset, or shaking. It was like that for years after she'd run away. She would get the shakes, and then the memories would come. Or she would see a sword, and then she'd remember. Or it would be winter, and that was the worst: for every sliver of ice reminded her of Arendelle and her mother. Awake or asleep she could hear the clanging that always meant battle. It was an echo in her ears that would not go away. But all she heard now was the wind. Someone had put a wall between her and her memories._

This isn't peace,_ a voice in her head told her. She quickly shut it down. It was the same part of her that reminded her of her deal with Hades._

_"I ran away," she continued. How the story came from her, frighteningly mechanical, she didn't know. "I wasn't... I wasn't planning on living." Elsa touched the scars on her forehead. They were receding, from the pink that stood out when they were new, to a pale milky white not unlike the rest of her body._

_"And then you found that demon in a cave," Sourpuss said. He knew a little of this part. The story would have gone on forever if she had to explain all this business with gods and contracts._

_"Hades isn't a demon," she said. "He's a... fallen god."_

_"It's all the same."_

_There were a few differences, but nothing that Elsa cared to elaborate on. "Is this your way of saying I made a deal with the devil? You and your poetry, Alexander."_

_"I'm not trying to antagonize you or make you feel defensive or anything," he said._

_She wished someone could just understand that she couldn't live with her own self with her powers. There was no peace to be had as Elsa the Ice Princess. Elya the Nobody was much better. Easier to live with._

_"I'm sorry," Sourpuss said again._

_Elsa exhaled, some tension leaking out of her. She leaned on Alexander's shoulder. It was her way of permitting him to comfort her. And comfort her he did, mussing her hair and placing his cheek atop her._

_Something slotted in place. She belonged here. This was what peace was. That is what she told herself._

You won't have a soul for seven years,_ Hades said. _Like a mirror, y'know? Your feelings won't be real. As your soul recovers, you will start to feel in short bursts, but they won't last. You really wanna spend seven years like that? You guys don't live forever, you know.

_She ignored the possibility that everything she felt now was simply an illusion._

_"There's nothing to be sorry for," she said._

_/*_

_/**/_

_*/_

"Listen kid, turning off magic ain't like turning off a television..."

"They don't have televisions yet, Hades."

"Shush! I was getting all dramatic. Now. You can't just turn off your magic. It's a part of you. More like, a part of your soul."

The woman with the dark hair snorted. "You almost sound like a bard."

"Dammit, Megara! I'm trying to be nice. I can't stand how lame I feel. How do heroes do it?"

"They're too dumb to realize how stupid they are. Hey, finish explaining it to her already."

"Look, I'm in charge of the undead -"

"Was."

"I was in charge of the undead. I get to say 'soul' without bullshit touchy-feely implications. But seriously. All magic comes from your soul. And messing with souls is not this jaded old god's thing. Anymore. Leave, Princess of Wherever. Get over yourself."

/**/

* * *

**Present Day**

**Jeremy the Spymaster**

/*

*/

Although he should have been running with the news of his report, he was instead looking out of the second floor and into the courtyard, where the Myrmidons carried on with their usual pursuits: training and getting better, and reading and failing to learn anything. It was their morning warmup, before breakfast. He could recognize them now with a casual look: the thief and second-in-command, Robin; the ambidextrous leader Monkey; the pretty-boy swordsman with a scowl, Sourpuss - and where Sourpuss sat one could always find the masked Coldsnap.

Anna had had her dinner with Monkey and made no mention of meeting the woman who helped save her brother. Which meant, if he knew Anna, that she was apprehensive about meeting her sister. Well, she had a few days to settle _that_, for she would be sailing soon to Corona, and then she'd have to conveniently bump into her sister somehow on the ship, or maybe before the ball at Corona, neither of which were likely to happen.

He thought himself neutral to the whole affair: ordered to track down a girl gone for more than ten years, having to arrange a meeting between himself and the mercenaries, and having to make sure Elsa was among those he had hired: he could have done it more willingly, but looking back now, he realized how he'd dragged his feet.

He did not want to see Elsa. Mercenary life (or guard life) suited her: she could protect some principal and kill anyone and tell herself she was doing the right thing. She had her life, she had her brand new _family. _She had her routine, and now it was about to be shaken up.

And he didn't care much about Elsa's side of things, but of all the things Anna asked for, she asked for the one person who could fuck things up in court. She was fine now, the Queen. She was ruling well and plans were going apace - and then she asked for her sister.

If Elsa returned to the fold she'd be the elder royal, easily manipulated, with no political savvy at all. Savvy was not something one picked up overnight, just as one did not pick up a sword and stab around hoping to hit a mark. It was something that had to be nurtured, a skill that had to be taken for granted, because no slips could be made. One did not _wear_ the mask - one _was _the mask. He did not need someone so close to Anna by virtue of something as random as blood to be so naive, so easily out of his (or Anna's) control. He could see Elsa swayed, her spear used against her and she wouldn't even know it.

Of course, this was all conjecture, but Jeremy specialized in worst cases: Arendelle was the worst case he'd ever seen of a country ravaged by war. And it was precisely because of how good he was that Arendelle had shaken off the invaders and stood like a proud beacon of the north. Not that he was one for pretty, empty words unless he was trading it with pretty, empty people: it was simply a fact that he was the best of his kind, the smartest man in the Northern continent, serving its greatest Queen.

At some point, he knew, Elsa would hurt Anna. Inadvertently, most likely. He had told Anna this: to let go of the damned past. But the Queen insisted and he did as he was told. Which might have been a stupid move.

And so he took it out on everyone by annoying them with his cheap giddiness.

And so he took it out especially on the guards and soldiers who were a stupid lot that could only do as they were told. Kristoff most especially. The man was as dumb as his hair was blonde. Anna had a thing for dumb blondes. Her sister's fault, he was sure.

And so he took it out on Anna by training her to get used to the trite bullshit that constituted polite discourse in foreign courts. He could have been kinder about it, but it was his way of telling Anna _this entire plan is stupid_. And Anna would reply with _just give it a try. _She had so much hope, it made him wince. Worse yet was that she was tiptoeing around the whole situation. She was afraid to reach out. He knew why, she knew why. Elsa was a true to life carrot (again with the whole _hope_ thing) and Anna was the donkey, and she was afraid of reaching out, lest it all be an illusion.

Anna was not normally this stupid. If she wanted something, she got it. This sudden prevaricating attitude would have gotten her killed in a fight. She knew better. The situation did not make Jeremy's job easier. But for now, he had a job to do, and he would do it with the same flourish he annoyed the world with.

/**/

* * *

**Present Day**

**Coldsnap**

/*

*/

When Coldsnap entered the Great Hall for breakfast, she didn't expect to feel the cold.

She didn't expect to see badly shaped snowmen, made in some mangled attempt to appear welcoming to the guests.

She certainly did not expect the light flurry of snowflakes that suddenly appeared at their entrance. Sourpuss immediately looked to her, as did Robin, and she stared at her gloved hands, wondering if her seals had broken, not after all the trouble it had taken to seal her magic. But before she could take out her gloves and examine the tattoos, she heard her half-brother speak.

"Hi everyone!"

Soft bursts of snow flew with clumsy control from his fingertips.

_Oh, shit_ did not cover how she felt at all.

Her brother had her powers.

Her brother had her curse.

And then the doors opened and Anna - Queen Anna - came in.

And then she smiled and said. "I thought we said we'd play in the western hall?"

"I got excited! Look, it's exactly like them!" he was pointing to a funnily shaped snowman, which had a leather jerkin and an iron half-helm. It was not a bad attempt, crude as only a child could make.

Anna watched him for just a little longer, letting him enjoy the ice for a few extra seconds.

"Prince Olaf." It was a gentle rebuke from his sister. "You can practice your skills after breakfast. Now, how do we clean up after playing?"

Olaf deflated just a bit and let himself be picked up by Marshall. He waved his hands and slowly the ice began to disappear, gently, turning finer and finer and then _nothing, _and the temperature returned. No trace of melting or water anywhere, not even where the largest snowman (an attempt at a footman) once stood. It was perfect, utter control over the power to turn ice into nothing.

Not even Elsa had such perfect control over dissipating ice when she was a child.

Anna assuaged him with a pat on the head when he was dropped to his place next to his sister, at the head of the long table. Meanwhile Elsa found herself gently being steered to a place between Robin and Sourpuss. She was sat, and heard rather than saw her bowl appear in front of her. She didn't want to see her hands, so she kept them on her knees.

Neither Sourpuss nor Robin said a word, giving her space to think.

That this was fucked up was her first thought. Then she was engulfed by a burning jealousy for her brother, with the kind of intensity that made her quiver. Her brother was pouting up ahead at the end of the table.

That earned him a kiss on the head from his sister. On his head, with his hair so blonde and fine it was just like hers. He had Anna's smile.

And then the jealousy gave way to a jolt of pain, with her wondering _why?_

A torrent of questions could not be dammed within her: _what was it all for?_

_/*_

_*/_

* * *

**Ending notes:**

Oh no. Sourpuss's backstory is he's a bastard? How much more predictable can this story be? *yawn* I'm a lazy writer. Or maybe i'm not. Why does every fantasy story have to feature a bastard?

About their ages: Elsa & Kristoff are 25, Anna is turning 22.

No guarantees when then next chapter gets released, sorry. Can check ateliersockpuppet tumblr for updates.

Comments welcomed. Also a beta reader. Though I am a Picky Dick when it comes to editors.

See you guys next chapter, where our miserable heroes go to Corona.


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